In the last year and a half, I’ve taught hours upon hours of private classes to over 50 students who I have never met in real life. This is because I give a good chunk of my English classes over the telephone. Most people find this odd, but there is actually a rather high demand for this type of class. They say that a large percentage of comprehension is due to body language and not to the actual words coming out a person’s mouth. When talking over the phone, you take out body language out of the equation and any and all comprehension depends on those little floppy things hanging off the sides of your head.

Since it’s a bit more difficult to follow a book during these classes, most people choose to have conversation classes using articles I send them as a way to improve vocabulary and conversation skills. One great website (www.breakingnewsenglish.com) is a bountiful source of short and sweet articles that provide enough fodder to get me through each 30 minute lesson.

This week’s article resounded with me as it not only talks about the field in which I work, teaching English, but also, more specifically, about the company my brother Chris works for in Japan and all the hubbub surrounding the recent mess they’ve gotten themselves into. This should be a fun week’s worth of conversation.

Any points of interest you can add Chris?

Japan’s biggest English school in trouble

Nova Corporation, Japan’s largest English conversation school chain is in serious financial trouble. The company, which employs some 4,000 non-Japanese English teachers, was given court protection from creditors on October 26th. It has debts of around $357 million and has given up any efforts to try and clear them. Nova’s directors are hoping to find sponsors to keep the majority of its 900 schools operational. The company’s disgraced president is nowhere to be found. Nozomu Sahashi, 56, owns a 16 percent stake in the company but was fired on Thursday. The board accused him of financial wrongdoing, as he could not give an adequate explanation for his “opaque way of fund-raising and negotiating with potential business alliance partners.”

Nova’s collapse has angered thousands of teachers, many of whom have not been paid. A union representative, Katsuji Yamahara, expressed his concerns saying: “This is a serious development that could force many students, instructors and employees to suffer losses.” Some teachers now face eviction from their company-provided accommodation. There have even been cases of Nova deducting rent from teachers’ salaries and then not paying landlords. Teachers at the scandal-hit school went on strike last week to protest against the company’s malpractices. The final nail in the coffin for Nova seems to have been a discovery that its advertising lied to potential students about its services. Nationwide ads claimed students could take lessons any time they wanted, which proved to be untrue.